Former South African foreign minister Naledi Pandor recently let a secret out: that the idea for taking Israel to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and accusing it of “genocide” came from anti-Israel lawyer John Dugard, via former South African intelligence minister Ronnie Kasrils, and that the plan was hidden from the South African public in order to avoid criticism and debate from leaders in the Jewish community.
Dugard made his reputation as one of several human rights lawyers in South Africa who opposed the apartheid regime, but he has since made a career out of attacking Israel on the international stage, falsely accusing it of “apartheid.” (There is no discrimination against Arabs in Israel, and separations among Jews and Arabs in “occupied” territories have been driven almost entirely by Palestinian terror against Israel.)
Kasrils is a communist and former leader in the African National Congress known for his hot-headedness. He served in the early post-apartheid governments before falling out of political favor, but not before launching a campaign against Israel that he has continued into his retirement. (I documented Kasrils’s early efforts to mobilize a fringe of left-wing Jews in South Africa to oppose Israel, which inspired similar efforts worldwide.)
According to Pandor, in recently resurfaced remarks from an interview last year, Dugard — whom she did not know well — contacted her through Kasrils, who was pinging her constantly on WhatsApp about the supposed “genocide” going on in Gaza. Other ministers — who were perhaps also hearing from Kasrils — approached her about starting the ICJ case, which she and the Cabinet kept a close secret, anticipating public opposition.
The irony is rich: Kasrils himself is a proud supporter of “genocide,” at least when it comes to Israelis and Jews. In 2023, as Breitbart News reported, Kasrils proudly celebrated the Hamas terror attack of October 7. He called the murder of 1200 people — mostly civilians — “brilliant, spectacular,” and “damned good.” In his own words: “They [Hamas] swept on them, and they killed them, and damned good! I was so pleased.”
Kasrils has associated himself with Hamas for almost two decades, knowing that its ideological aims are explicitly genocidal. This, however, was a different level of endorsement — a happy exultation at mass murder. The Hamas attack aimed to spur other terror groups, notably Hezbollah, to join in the slaughter, hoping to destroy all of Israel — Jews and Arabs alike. Kasrils enthusiastically supports that genocidal plan.
The effort to accuse Israel of “genocide” at the ICJ must be understood in that context. It is not simply an absurd legal case, but an effort to support Hamas by denying Israel the right to defend itself. Indeed, the South African legal team explicitly made the argument that Israel is not allowed to defend itself against Hamas because it is guilty of “occupation” — even though Israel had pulled out of Gaza completely in 2005.
If South Africa had its way at the ICJ, Israel would have been ordered to stop fighting Hamas, and the Iran-backed terrorists would have scored a major victory in their effort to destroy Israel and everyone living in it.
Questions remain about how whether Iran was involved in urging, and bankrolling, the South African case. But one thing is clear: it is Kasrils, and South Africa, who belong in the dock for “genocide” — not Israel.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of Trump 2.0: The Most Dramatic ‘First 100 Days’ in Presidential History, available for Amazon Kindle. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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